by Massive Voodoo

This time Bene will lose some words about the new Miniature Holder designed by the famous "Kringelmeister" Stephan Rath. The miniature holder which is reviewed here is Generation 3, so there is visible that Stephan has this idea since a long time and put a lot of time, tests and experience into the development of this product, to bring it to the best possible result.

Build Quality/Finish

We start by having a closer look at the build quality and the finish of the miniature holders. As you see, there are two color options available a light beech - like one and a darker one, something like walnut. In my opinion both colors are a nice choice and it depends only on your taste if you prefer the lighter or darker tone.

The wood for the handles is very nice manufactured, the shape of the miniature holder is well thought out and fits really comfortably in your hand while painting or sculpting. Also the finish of the wood is very smooth and a pleasure to have in your hand.

Functions and features

If you want to put your project aside for taking a break, the miniature holders are delivered with something like a pedestal, where you can easily put the holders with your project in and they will have a save stand on your desk.

As you can see, there are also different types of cork, on for busts and ond one for full miniatures or sculpts. Normally they also come with a wire bracket, but I´m so used to work without, that it didn´t show up on the pictures. They can be very helpful indeed when you work on freehands or very small details and want to stabilize your hand. There are also some different sizes for the wire brackets available, 32mm, 54mm and 75mm.

Here you can see the mechanism for releasing the cork to mount a miniature into the miniature holder or when you want to switch the cork for painting a bust for example. You just need to stick the end of a brush or another tool into the hole on the side of the miniature holder and with a bit of levering the cork will come off easily. Still it sits very stable once lightly pressed into the wood part of the miniature so there is no danger that you figure will come off the holder while you are working on it.

This is how it will look with a miniature mounted on the holder. You can mount the miniature with its tag like I did in this example although this is actually quite impractical. You will have to cut it off after the miniature is finished and also the tag is already a bit thick to fit it into that cork. Much better is the second option, by cutting the tag off and just using a wire pin. The miniature will still be hold safely and you don´t have to remove the tag after finishing the miniature.

These pictures were from a test painting session where I finished this little figure and also added a few very simple freehands for a test purpose. While it was nothing really complicated it felt much more comfortable to do the work on the miniature holder instead of a simple wood block or cork.

Conclusion

After reading that little review you might ask yourself if you need these miniature holders or not?

Well, the most used other options are from my experience relatively simple wood blocks or just corks. These two options will do the job also but from my testing I can say that the miniature holder is offering quite a lot more comfort and therefore makes miniature painting or sculpting even more fun and relaxation for me.

So to answer the question above: You probably don´t need it, but if you are looking for a nice and comfortable solution to hold your miniatures I definately can recommend the miniature holders and I´m pretty sure that they will give a little benefit to your workflow and comfort while painting.

Currently the kickstarter is still running so make sure to take a look at it. But not much time is left and I´m not sure when the holders will be available after the campaign.

by Roman aka jar

by Massive Voodoo

"Conan, what is best in life?"

"To crush your enemies, see them driven before you and hear the lamantation of their women ... well, wait, I am not sure - No, it is time. If you have time you can crush your enemies... and so on! If you do not have time you just can't. Time."

"Thanks, Conan. You are right!"

_______________________________________________________________________________Tuesday and no Tutorial Voting?
Well, this week is going crazy it seems when it comes to time.
MV members are getting ready to head out to a trip to Scale Model Challenge 2016 on Thursday and we are so busy this weeks with tons of mails and do not even find time to meet up in the studio for some painting hours.

We are very much forward to this crazy weekend, meeting old and new friends and miniature and vehicle madness in an unknow scale :)

BUT...
We made a decision for this week. We will be lazy on the blog as we just do not find the time.

by Massive Voodoo

by Massive Voodoo

Good Monday Morning Jungle,

and what a glorious morning it is.
People used to dislike Mondays as it means the start of a new week and much work ahead of all of us.
Whay not make this Monday different and be energetic instead, happy, joyful and excited about a fresh new week that might bring you a smile around the next corner, if you smile yourself.

Allright, so much to the intro of this. The whole MV crew have something to tell you today.

Something important:

MASSIVE VOODOO. Seven years now.
Time is flying by, but paint still flows regularly and happy painting spirits are high :)
Actually we even forgot the actual day of birth of this blog. Well, let's say we failed in checking back properly. We know its September so we will just celebrate it in this month.

Thanks
to all our readers, supporters, friends and family who come here to the heart of the jungle to find some peace and inspiration.

OUR BIRTHDAY GIFT to Massi... uhm, you!
Massive Voodoo is a place were many of you drop by to calm the sounds of the city, the waves of the day and the sounds of work. Looking closer it is not this blog. It is the painting joy and relaxation you find at your workspace. The small palace of paint that we all share. A tiny dark corner, lid by daylight, with tiny brushes, tiny figures and tiny paints.

MASSIVE VOODOO BIRTHDAY HISTORY
Even the world is changing fast Massive Voodoo stays the same and keeps up with traditions. To our first year of MV birthday celebrations we asked for a photo of your workbenches and we recieved tons.

Workspace again it is.
We want to see your actual miniature hobby workspace, corner, table, garage or island. If you want you can clean it up or show it to us vibrantly just like it looks right now. For inspiration you can have a look on Roman's article about his workspace history.

This is for you to win:

One winner will have a chat with Raffa,
one person with Peter and one will have a chat with Roman for about 1 hour each.

The final date will be matched with the winners wish, individually with the one monkey you are skyping with. We can talk about Miniatures, your projects, about MV if
you like, about the future of the hobby, about your ideas and visions,
maybe bikinis or the beauty of it all - in fact whatever you like to talk with us about and we
already guess that one hour is quite short.

You can participate if ...
- you are able to talk english or german (no need for perfect english as ours is bad also)
- have an acutal version of Skype installed and now how to handle
- you are a follower of MV, here at the blog or via facebook or whatever.How can I win this?
We are again after a photo of your workbenches.
Show us your temple of colours,
your place where you enjoy the hobby. Don't clean it up or prepare it
for a photoshoot - just take it from the moment. Or clean it up and make a superstylish-hipster-black-and-white-photo. The three workspaces
which will hit Roman's heart the most will win the Skyping. Roman is doing the judging and organisational matters of this and we keep it easy for the judging on our side. Roman's heart it is.

Your entry will be confirmed with an email by Roman. Not in seconds after sending it, but everytime Roman is doing mails.
For sure you can write whatever you like to your mail or here in the comments, like birthday
wishes, some personal thoughts or more BUT please don't forget to add a
photo of your workspace, only one photo please. All entries that miss
one of these points will be disqualified.Here are four examples on how your entry can look like:

He picked up both MV monkeys in Oslo
and instead of driving home to Arvika he had a surprise for us and took
us to a hidden place somewhere in Sweden's deep forests - a car
graveyard with over 800 rusting cars, aged by weathering and nature's
power - a beautiful place to take photos and draw inspiration:

If you want to see more inspirational photos and you learn to observe
and study real life things for your miniature painting inspiration, you
can find more photos like this on Roman's photo instagram account:have a look and stay inspired!

by Massive Voodoo

If you want to keep track with an overview on what has happened so far in MV's year of the painter 2 please check this link!
_______________________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________You want to support us?
If you like to support or say thanks the monkeys of Massive Voodoo in what they do, please feel invited to drop a jungle donation in their direction via paypal or check their miniatures they got on sale here or here.
_______________________________________________________________________________

In this article you will see the armor part of the bust "Firestarter" that I sculpted and painted. The bust is released at Fernando Ruiz Miniatures if you are interested in getting one!

This is how the effect looks on the final miniature

Now let's start!

The first step was to prime and basecoat the parts using 'Heavy Metal' by Scale Color.

Now the parts were randomly dabbed with Medium Rust by Model Mates.
In the beginning it often looks a bit strange, but when it is dry, it looks very nice and rusty.

Here is the other side.

Both parts got a light drybrush of 'Heavy Metal'

It makes the plates look like the edges still get some use and get randomly beaten up.

It created a very strange effect... Almost looks like the medium destroyed and crackled some of the rust color.

Really a bit strange :D

But for now I tried to ignore it and continued airbrushing the next layer, a very neutral olive grey.
It was an olive tone by AK Interactive airbrush colors.

After the color was dry I started to remove some of the paint using a bristle brush and warm water.
By using the chipping medium you can easily remove top layers of paint with some rubbing and warm water.

The rust color turned a bit yellow. It seems that chipping medium and water are not best friends with the rust paint.

The Model Mates rust was applied another time taking care not to hit the areas where the olive paint was sitting.

The edges of the chipped olive paint were hightlighted with a mix of white and olive.
This created a very three dimensional effect.

In the end a little freehand was painted with off-white and I airbrushed a shadow on the sides of the parts using 'Strong Tone' by Army Painter. To give it a slightly metallic look I used a graphite pencil to softly stroke some of the edges. The slight shine gives it a nice touch.

At this point I called the parts done. It's a really fast and nice technique to create this effect.
Try it yourself!

I really hope you enjoyed this Step by Step! Let me know in the comments!

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Welcome to the Jungle...

... MASSIVE VOODOO’s jungle, where some apes share their thoughts and ideas around their beloved passion, the hobby of miniature painting and sculpting.

Feel welcome to come and check the jungle for tons of articles, interesting tutorials, creative competitions and the simple joy of happy painting hidden behind every tree. We hope that everyone finds their own banana in here, if not do not hesitate to ask the apes. We are more than happy for you to post in the comments section to help turn this jungle into the lush, overgrown painting corner we hope it will become.